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Sunday, January 9, 2011

Wow. So. Less than a week until the next Made With Love Bazaar, and I’m not exactly sure how that happened. I had many grand plans for over the Christmas break; all sorts of inspiration floating through my head. Sadly, that’s where they seem to have stayed.

One of my pieces of inspiration came from the amount of discarded boxer shorts I have picked up on my travels. While I’ve been making business shirt cushion covers, I’ve come to the realization that some pyjama tops have fantastic patterns on them. And piping. Oh, how I love piping. This lead to me ending up with a few awesome pairs of guy’s cotton boxer shorts, and thinking myself very lucky for having such variety for myself. Guy’s boxers are always so much more comfortable than chick’s – plus they actually cover your ass. However, there’s only so many pairs of boxer shorts that a girl needs.

So this week I’ve been working on some pyjama sets, using the aforementioned boxers, some brand spanking new singlets prettied up with some matching appliqué, and drawstring pyjama bags (I found a great tute for drawstring bags here). A fairly simple task - or so I assumed.

My main hassle occurred after effortlessly cutting out the appliqué design and bonding it to the singlet (if you do appliqué, and haven’t ever used Heat ‘N’ Bond before, stop whatever you’re doing and go to Spotlight to buy some. It is EXCELLENT! – when used correctly. Please read the instructions first. It’s like a double-sided interfacing that bonds your two pieces of fabric together and it makes everything soooo much easier. This message was brought to you by Turning Trixie Productions TM.) and I was surprising myself with the lack of effort. Normally simple things make themselves difficult once they reach my hands. Well. Once I got to my sewing machine it had other ideas about the difficulty level and played up something rotten. It kept skipping stitches and it took me a lot of time to figure it out.

Sarah Guide To Sewing Machine Troubleshooting:

Unpick the mistake.

Change the tension.

Sew.

Unpick.

Change tension again.

Sew.

Unpick.

Read manual.

Change machine needle.

Sew.

Unpick.

Rethread machine.

Change tension.

Sew.

Unpick.

Refer to manual again.

Change tension.

Sew.

Headbutt table.

Unpick.

Change tension.

Change stitch length.

Is it??!?... IS IT?!?!?... By George, I think I’ve fixed it!! That wasn’t difficult at all *eye twitch*

During this process I also concerned myself with the idea that perhaps my items would end up looking like appliqué splat, which is closely related to doily splat.

Doily Splat: When a doily has been taken in hand and thoughtlessly applied to an item, eg. cardigan, t-shirt, pillowcase, etc. Michelle and I spoke of this phenomenon one night when I’d rocked up to Stitch ‘N’ Bitch with a pillowcase and my doily box in tow (yes, I have a doily box. You’re so jealous right now.). The conversation threw me into an existential type crisis on when it IS ok to apply a doily to something, and whether I’d been misguidedly applying to doilies to all and sundry under the impression that I was doing some good in the world. My fears have been abated ,however, and in sewing, as in scrapbooking, you just need to work a doily into the design of your crafty item. You can’t just splat things anywhere – you need to think this shit through, people.

But anyway, it’s all finished now. And with only 6 days (!) to go until the next Made With Love, I’m hoping to get a few more things done, including picking up an awesome outfit for the next dress-up theme. Hurrah!

I Am...

A twenty-something currently living on the North-West coast of Tasmania. I indulge in a certain amount of craftiness, well-intended rambling, and too much coffee. My name is Sarah - welcome to my world.